Activity Designer

Suns have often been a big part of many different cultures and celebrations--suns in Mexican folk art represent life cycles, positivity, and flourishing nature. People create and paint them to celebrate being people of the sun!

What You'll Need

How We Did It

These suns are traditionally about driving force, emotions, and the sun's influencing power.... so we were designing accordingly!

We talked about how Metapec Suns are often rounded, convex, or flat. Madeleine envisioned hers as flat, so she formed a round ball in her hands, then rolled it out a bit.

I wanted convex--so I just put my sun over a medium-size lid to raise up the center a little.

We found the easiest way for us to form our rays the way we wanted was to form them individually, then press them to the outside of our suns. Alternatively, you could make your sun extra large, and then cut off pieces to make the sun's rays.

Next we added our faces! In this folk art, sometimes shapes are cut out to create holes for the eyes, nose, or mouth, but we chose sculpting as our style.

We put two small holes in for hanging, then we let them dry overnight. I flipped them over once to dry the undersides.
Time to paint!

It was so much fun to see them becoming so beautiful and bright! Painting something in beautiful colors is definitely a favorite of Maddie's.